Certain customer loyalty systems allow users to check in at a physical merchant location to receive loyalty credit for visiting the business. These loyalty credits may be used to reward customers who frequently visit the merchant with special offers, discounts, or other benefits. Merchants may desire to categorize customers according to how often they visit the merchant location to customize rewards for customer loyalty.
Traditionally, merchants do not have a generalized framework to define various loyalty categories for their customer rewards. Furthermore, a need exists to address how a number of check-in events or other actions corresponding to a loyalty reward system may vary significantly between merchants or types of merchants. For example, a coffee shop may expect loyalty customers to visit several times a week while customers may visit a hotel less frequently.
Another deficiency in technology related to customer loyalty programs relates to latency in any system for tracking customer loyalty. Such latency would become particularly relevant if the customer loyalty categories are also involved. For example, a user currently checking in to a merchant location may now be eligible for a loyalty category upgrade thanks to loyalty recognition gained during the current visit. The present check-in and related upgrade traditionally takes some amount of time to process and track. This time delay, or latency, can prevent the recognition or application of the new upgraded loyalty category on the same visit thereby frustrating the customer instead of rewarding their loyalty as initially desired.